Mots-clés

Agoraphobia

Phobia / Social phobia / Agoraphobia

Phobia is an excessive fear of an object, a circumstance, a situation that goes hand in hand with an avoidance reaction. We speak of phobia when fear is systematic and uncontrollable, phobia is also characterized by violent states of panic as well as the implementation of more or less elaborate avoidance strategies to escape any confrontation. Phobia is one of the most common anxiety disorders. There are three main forms: social phobia (excessive fear of other's gaze and negative judgments), agoraphobia (fear of certain situations of confinement or isolation), and specific phobias (fears of animals, blood, height, etc.).
Social phobia is one of the most common phobias. This pathology is quite different from simple shyness. Although the severity may be more or less severe, people with social phobia have an intense and systematic fear of one or more types of "social interaction" situations, i.e., exchange with one or more other people. They fear and anticipate negative judgment, not because of a sense of persecution but because of a lack of self-confidence or self-esteem. Every meeting is seen as a potential exam: "What will people think if I have nothing to say? ", "I'm going to stammer and look ridiculous!" "I must buy these shoes that I just tried on, otherwise the seller will be unhappy ». These situations trigger quite violent emotional and physical symptoms, which push the person to withdraw and lose even more self-confidence. Whereas in normal shyness, fear diminishes with experience, in social phobia it is maintained or gets worse with time as a result of painful confrontations. Social phobia has two well-documented psychological risks: depression, for about half of those affected by a severe form, and addictions; use of alcohol or other drugs, such as cannabis or anxiolytic medication, to relax and disinhibit themselves in stressful social situations, they then become tolerant with increased use to the point of developing a real addiction.
Agoraphobia was initially defined by fear of wide open spaces and/or crowds. The current definition is broadened to fear of all situations from which one cannot easily escape in the event of discomfort, incident, or panic attacks, or in which one cannot receive help in the event of a problem. In people with panic disorder, the main fear concerns the risk of a seizure, while in other people this fear is more blurred, with the intuition of a risk of discomfort, a fall, or other poorly defined accident. Typically, the situations feared are crowds, especially in closed environments (underground, department stores, auditoriums), other enclosed places whose exit is not immediate (trains, planes, lifts), but also open places within which patients fear losing their bearings and not finding support (e.g. a large empty square to cross, or a street or bridge). In extreme cases, simply moving away from a safe area, usually home, causes intense fear or even panic attacks, severely limiting the possibilities of normal movement. As with any phobia, fear is recognised by the person as irrational, excessive, but creates significant discomfort in their life. It is accompanied by avoidance or leakage behaviours, and contra-phobic reinsurance behaviours that essentially consist of a need for accompaniment to face the feared situations, which leads to significant dependency.